It’s time for nostalgia this week! So, who will spill their most embarrassing childhood memory for points?

This Week’s Challenge: Tie your summary into a memory from your childhood for 30 points!

Samurai Jam ~Bakumatsu Rock~ (Episode Three)
Player: Kanashimi
Class: Boss

We start this episode learning that every club that has played anything other than Heaven’s Song has been shut down. That’s why they must find Yoshida in an effort to divert the crisis. Also, our trio now has merch and is in debt to the restaurant owner who made all this stuff without asking. Oh good, this is a make-money episode, isn’t it? Let’s all get hired as stagehands for a song none of us like!

While the opening plays and the filler episode continues, I’ll do that talk-about-my-childhood thing. Obviously, there are a lot of historical facts I’ve brought up and it’s apparent my interest in the subject is somewhat avid. Growing up I had some amazing history teachers, but the first one from seventh grade is one I still remember extremely vividly. I mean, it’s hard to forget a teacher that claims you won’t have any homework on the first day of school. That’s already awesome, but he was extremely inactive in his teaching method. “Here’s a Yucca tree, let’s use it for soap!” or “Oh, hey, let’s make bullet castings because that’s totally safe for twelve and thirteen year olds.” History has reflection on what’s going on, and you don’t really learn that unless you’re able to get intrigued by what you learn. This really works for all subjects, but my love of history was fueled by some amazing teachers with a jumpstart in middle school.

Anyway, back to the show… The trio are spying on the Shinsengumi practice and going through all of their merch, because why not be a creeper? In addition, apparently film crews are totally a thing that happened during this time period. Whoa, whoa, whoa—stop!

So Kondo received a letter from a higher up suggesting Okita pretend to be sick for sympathy or whatever. Please, please don’t tell me this is a real thing they’re going with. Not only was the real Okita an amazing warrior, but his short life ended from tuberculosis. I understand this show wants to be some insane alternative history setting, but c’mon… that one doesn’t sit right with me. I don’t want to imagine all of my friends fighting and dying while I’m chillin’ in bed because my lungs are about to collapse.

Thought I wasn’t gonna get a random history fact in this week. Anyway, the Shinsengumi are taking forever to get on stage, so Ryouma is like “let’s take over because he’s a hothead.” Obviously they get pelted with glowsticks. Blah, blah, time to watch the concert, and Ryouma begins to get into it by singing in the crowd. The Shinsengumi seem like they’re going to sword fight on stage, but it’s just lightsabers—er, I mean glowstick swords.

Either way, all filler… more of the Shinsengumi performing and the short-term goal of money for our heroes for this episode alone. I don’t have a whole lot else to say about this episode quite honestly. It was about as predictable as could be with little to no action.

Watch Samurai Jam ~Bakumatsu Rock~ on Crunchyroll or talk about this episode on our forums.

Captain Earth (Episode Fifteen)
Player: Bobby Henshin
Class: DJ

Oh my god. I can’t believe it, guys. Actual story and character progression. It’s so beautiful, and it only took fifteen episodes! Last we left off The Midsummer Knights’ beach vacation took both an emotional and dangerous turn. Hana and Daichi’s relationship is coming into fruition and so is the plot of the Planetary Gears. Let’s get started, shall we?

At the Knights’ train base, the team is worried about what they are going to do now that Hana is MIA. Hana ran away, and no one could find her. So they are making plans for the worst case scenario while questioning why Daichi let her go away in the first place. Also, it looks like the press is hiding the giant laser Hana fired off, called The Blume, as a solar flare, and we are supposed to be getting another one soon.

Meanwhile, at Macbeth HQ, Amarok and Moco are trying to figure out what to do, seeing as they were running out of Orgone energy. So they need to bring Siren~sama to their side now more then ever. Siren is actually Setsuna from four episodes ago. Both her and Hana are actually members of the royal family to the Planetary Gears, which allows them to control Orgone energy. Hana uses it as a weapon while Siren uses it as an energy source for the Goodfellows. Daichi does not care and only wishes to find Hana.

Speak of the devil. We find Hana at a traditional Japanese temple where people are visiting. Pitz jumps off her head and starts running to a crowd of people. Pitz locates Lappa, the pink alien squirrel belonging to Setsuna. She is on a blanket covered in hand-drawn drawings of her with Setsuna trying to earn some extra money. Hana and Setsuna talk for a while about why they both ran away. Hana believes that Daichi won’t accept her love or her now that he knows what she is, while Setsuna doesn’t believe she can trust people at all anymore. But she does feel that she is able to trust Hana. But the small peace is short lived as Amarok starts walking down the pathway. They both make a run for it.

Surprisingly this is where my childhood memory is sparked for this weeks challenge. When I was about 12 going on 13, my family and I were going to Myrtle Beach. There was a pier, and I saw people selling stuff like seashells and random stuff, so I though I would try it myself. So I ran down to the beach, grabbed as many seashells as I could, and laid them down on my beach blanket as nicely as I could, and trying to wave people over and sell them for a dollar a shell. I made 5 bucks, so I was happy. My parents weren’t, though, because they had no idea where I was for the last hour and a half and looked extremely mad. I panicked, so I grabbed my towel and ran away, because kids never wanna get in trouble, so they run away. When they caught me, I was grounded for a good year. Long story short, always tell your folks where you are.

Back the the story, we find ourselves at Macbeth HQ in Kube’s office. His secretary tells him that the data he requested is now in his servers and also asks him out to dinner. Oh my! More romance, even within enemy ranks. Kube refuses, as he believes he has a lot of work to do. She leaves as Kube starts to plug away. But while researching, he finds some disturbing data and decides to pay Puck a little visit. The data he found was that the Goodfellows have been activated at the same time as all the Kiltgang attacks. Wait… You are just now realizing this? …Just now? I may be dense, but even I would have realized this in your position!

Hana and Setsuna are now on the run from Moco and Amarok as they are cornered. Hana makes Setsuna hide as Amarok shows up with an extremely angry look on his face, talking about all the trouble she has put them through for running away. As he grabs her, Pitz jumps into action and bites his ear off! Go Pitz! I knew it. Best character in the series is a blue and white alien squirrel. But Pitz is thrown against a wall and is seriously hurt.

Back at Macbeth, Kube talks to Puck, accusing Puck of using him all along. He threatens him with the shutdown switch that controls Puck. Puck then releases nerve gas into the chamber. Kube activates the switch, but it doesn’t work. Puck laughs and asks “Do you really think the switch would still work?” I kinda saw that coming, too. Kube falls back into a chair as the same machine that they tried to put Setsuna in forms around him, Puck laughing creepily the entire time. I mean, this laugh literally scared me.

Hana makes contact with the others, telling them that Pitz is hurt and that the Kiltgangs are after her. So they decide to find each other on the beach. While Daichi and Hana meet, Amarock runs into Setsuna, while Kube runs into his secretary. But something seems off about Kube as he says that he can finally move around. Let’s flash back for a second. Remember those machines that the creepy lesbian doctor tried to put Setsuna in so she could transfer her consciousness into her so she could live forever? Well I think you can put two and two together here. Puck is now Kube.

Now comes what I like to call the Shipping explosaganza scene! At the meetup of these three groups, everyone decides to kiss each other! Daichi plants a big one on Hana, to which I have to say freaking finally! Moco takes Lappa as Amarok plants one on Setsuna to turn her back into the princess, which looks kinda weird because, well, she looks 12. And Kube/Puck lands a big one on his secretary… And does a lot more then that, actually, but it fades to black. Amarok and Moco bow before the newly-awakened Siren as she gives the orders to tell her the current situation and to attack the Knights. Also Lappa disappeared. Back on the beach, Teppai and Akari catch up, seeing the two love birds finally becoming a couple, to which they also say finally. But the romantic scene is short-lived as Amarok and Moco show up in their Machine Goodfellows. They fight them off with their LivLasters til they are able to send their Engies to them. Nebula and Earth show up for a nice robot battle.

But while they are getting into the robots, they force their hand as Moco takes the chance to nab Hana. Daichi and Teppei use themselves as shields to protect Hana and are seriously hurt. Hana doesn’t want anything to hurt her friend and new boyfriend. She clinches her fist as a recorder plays in the background. Then a pinkish, purple light shines in her hand, which turns into the coolest LivLaster I’ve seen so far. Moco yells out the name “The Blossom” as Hana shoots the Goodfellow’s arm clean off. Hana is now on the freaking attack, and she fires unrelentingly at Moco hitting every single shot. Turns out Hana is able to control the beam and where it goes. So it’s like a homing laser which hits extremely hard. The Kiltgangs are now in a serious panic. Amarok is just shocked at the scene as he isn’t moving. He is surprised that the LivLaster has reached a new mode called Ecdysis Mode. Seriously though, look at his face.

You know the enemy is done for when they make that face. The Kiltgangs retreat, ending in another Midsummer Knights victory. They couldn’t stop Siren’s awakening due to them not knowing and call it an episode. This was an extremely good episode. We saw a new opening and ending. The ending is actually very catchy: “The Glory Days” by none other then Supercell! Why does Supercell make great music that sends a feeling of awesomeness down your spine? I’ll never know. Relationships were made, and a new Princess has been awakened. Kube is dead, as he is now Puck, and only bad stuff can start happening as we are reaching the final 10 episodes. So stay tuned next week as the Kiltkangs decide to go on the attack now that all their members are awakened. See you all next week!

Watch Captain Earth on Crunchyroll or talk about this episode on our forums.

JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders (Episode Fifteen)
Player: Elk
Class: DJ

When I left you fellows and fellesses, Polnareff was about to find Hol Horse’s dead body. In this, the 15th episode of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, we pick up exactly where we left off. Unfortunately for Polnareff and the old lady who hates him, he completely misses the dead body, which she manages to hide with her fog powers. He then continues to make a ton of unintentional jabs at her lack of family, days after killing her only son.

Turns out Hol Horse wasn’t actually dead yet, and he crawls out from the couch he was stashed under to warn Polnareff. Enyaba, the old lady, takes the time to strike, but Polnareff managed to dodge all of her scissor attacks. This only makes her reveal her Stand’s true power as what amounts to a ton of zombies burst through a door. For some reason they have spike tongues. Regardless, Polnareff runs away, leaving Hol Horse for dead, knowing one scratch is all it will take to make him into a puppet she can command. He blockades the door he runs through, but there seems to be no escape; with that in mind, he hides in one of the rooms.

It’s a toilet. Polnareff himself notes how ironic this is, as he’s always being attacked in bathrooms. Shadows pass across the light under the door, then leave. Polnareff, after some tense moments, looks through the keyhole, where he sees another eye looking back at him. A tongue darts through the hole and pierces his own tongue. Ewww, zombie make out session. This reminds me of this one time… *cue Wayne’s World flashback* It must’ve been in about 3rd grade, and a friend of mine was running around on the jungle gym during recess. He tripped and fell, and the jaw impact made a hole clear through his tongue he bit it so hard. It was like a hole punch. In the anime, however, it’s enough of an attack that Enyaba can make it into a puppet hole and drag him around by the tongue. Being in a bathroom, her first act as puppeteer is to have him clean the toilet with his tongue, which he REALLY tries to avoid while she makes weird tongue waggy faces. His tongue inches closer and closer until…

JoJo breaks into the room Hol Horse was “killed” in, and Enyaba goes back to meet him. JoJo asks her where Polnareff is, and she makes the same mistake as last episode calling him Jotaro. She nearly falls eye-first into the scissors when Jotaro “accidentally” trips her. He calls her on knowing his name and she makes the excuse that it must be on the sign in book. They check, and he wrote the name Qtaro.

It’s a fight! Hol Horse and Polnareff come in to warn him about her Stand, and he defeats a horde of zombies with Star Platinum, but a baby zombie pierces his leg. Enyaba celebrates her victory. Of course, having the series end here would be bad for the anime, so Jotaro pulls off some crazy deus ex machina and literally inhales her Stand, stopping her from breathing until she passes out.

Everyone mocks Polnareff for licking the toilet, and they walk outside to see they were actually in a graveyard the whole time. Joseph wants to use her with his Stand to gain insight, but they can’t without a TV, so they tie her up to take to the next city. Hol Horse, being the kind of guy he is, decides to steal their car to rejoin with Dio, though he also warns them they better kill the old lady or else they’ll regret it.

Watch JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders on Crunchyroll or talk about this episode on our forums.

The Irregular At Magic High School (Episode Fifteen)
Player: Kayarath
Class: Content Provider

It only took sixteen episodes, but we’re finally at a decent fight. It’s the dramatic final confrontation between teams First and Third High School. Can team Tatsuya take on the Crimson Prince and the Cardinal? At the start, even Tatsuya doubted his own odds, but after his sister says she’s sure he’ll win, Tatsuya decides to go all out. He doesn’t want to disappoint his sister, does he?

In a surprise to no one, Tatsuya has a new magical device to help give his team the edge. I swear, Tatsuya is like Harry Potter meets Batman. The item in question is a magical cloak which enhances magical spirits as well as providing protection against the Cardinal’s invisible bullet attack. Their only flaw is that Erika will laugh at you mercilessly for wearing ridiculous cloaks.

The match starts off with Tatsuya and the Prince going toe to toe in an intense one-on-one battle. Since the Cardinal is a genius, he concludes that he should do something and joins the fray. Leo and Mikihiko come meet him, and it becomes a real battlefield. In the ensuing chaos, Tatsuya manages to get a little too close to the Prince for his comfort. In his state of surprise, he casts an unrestrained attack spell powerful enough to kill Tatsuya. Even ninja dodging powers aren’t enough to save him, and Tatsuya gets hit by the attack. The Crimson Prince then angsts out over how he killed Tatsuya. Then Tatsuya gets up and delivers a knockout blow using sound magic. Was getting hit by lethal attack and then striking while your opponent was angsting over killing you all part of Tatsuya’s plan?

Of course there still is the Cardinal, but he’s a theorist and a fighter. With the cloaks and preperations Tatsuya made, he’s more or less handled. The guy’s no joke though. Getting hit with the invisible bullet still hurts a lot. Leo took a direct hit from one, and it took him a few minutes to get back up. It was a hard hit, but he was able to deal with it. Reminds me of a soccer game I played back in middle school. I was goalie, and some kid kicked a goal. The ball ended going right at me, and I wasn’t fast enough to dodge, so it it hit me right in the chest. Some of the kids thought the shot made my chest cave in, but I was alright in a few minutes.

With those two out, First Magic High School wins! Hooray! Tatsuya will have some explaining to do. In order to win, he had to pull out every trick in his book, and he has some seriously powerful tricks. Any person who saw this can see that, and there were a lot of people watching. Tatsuya can’t hide his Batman levels of power any longer. If he wants to be treated just like a regular guy after this match, he’ll have to come up with a ridiculously clever cover story. How will he get himself out of this mess? Tune in next week and find out!

Watch The Irregular at Magic High School on Daisuki or talk about this episode on our forums.

Terror in Resonance (Episode Three)
Player: Whiskahs
Class: Technomancer

Episode three has two plot threads: Lisa’s and Shibasaki’s. Throughout the episode we have clips of Lisa as she makes her way through another day in her life. Her mother continues her mad rambling and near-physical abuse of Lisa at home, while at school the laughter and harassment of those that bully her echoes in her mind, even when they are not around. The situation for her seems unbearable, and by the end of the episode, after failing to contact Nine and Twelve by phone, she packs a bag full of her clothing and runs away, presumably to attempt to join up with Nine and Twelve.

The rest of the episode mostly follows Shibasaki aside from a few scenes of Nine and Twelve conversing. We get a little more on his background, such as that he is from Hiroshima, and a bit about why he was demoted to manning the archives from his previous position at the head of the First Division through conversations between his peers. Among some of the younger officers there seems to be some distrust of Shibasaki at first, but that begins to fade away after another riddle and threat of bombing is issued by Nine and Twelve via video with their Sphinx monikers.

With the majority of the police out searching for bombs in temples throughout Tokyo (the initial guess by the detectives based on the riddle), Shibasaki retreats to the archives where he ponders about the variations of the take of Oedipus. His former companion in the archives stays with him, mostly eating and playing games, but after the fat man finishes a round of some online game on his phone, it inspires an epiphany for Shibasaki, who rushes out of the archives with the answer to Sphinx’s riddle.

Instead of simply disarming the bomb, Shibasaki posts a live video response to Sphinx’s riddle where he explains the rationale behind his answer while a bomb disposal team (and a hazmat team just in case the bomb had some radioactive components) raids the building where the bomb is located. After the bomb has been successfully disabled and Shibasaki finishes his answer, he closes with a threat to Sphinx that if they intend on using an atomic weapon in their terrorist plots that he’ll never stop hunting them. The other detectives cut him off, thinking that by being so forward Shibasaki might actually cause an escalation in Sphinx’s activities.

Given the rather grim nature of the show so far, I can’t say it really brings back in particularly positive memories from my childhood. Lisa’s predicament in particularly reminds me of a rather rough time when I was growing up, though I was quite a bit younger than her. The complete isolation she must feel given her social and home situation reminds me of the same thing I felt when I was at a point in my life where I was shuffling between different schools, and family matters were rather rough. It doesn’t really surprise me that she turns to Nine and Twelve, despite their destructive intentions, at the end of the episode, though I can’t say I have a particular parallel in my life to that. Instead of becoming a terrorist, I focused on slightly more constructive things such as writing and learning bits about web development, which ended up serving me well if my current situation is any indication.

Watch Terror in Resonance on Funimation or talk about this episode on our forums.

DRAMAtical Murder (Episode Three)
Player: Sho
Class: Content Provider

Extra drama on DRAMAtical Murder this week. It seems like the person that pulled Aoba into the Rhyme match was a heavily-pierced guy named Noiz–white noise if you look at the color of his clothes. He approaches Aoba again in his room, early in the episode, and he confronts a very confused Aoba about the match that they fought in the previous episodes. Aoba, who had no idea about what had happened because he lost his memory about it, was severely confused about what Noiz was talking about. Noiz continued to press Aoba about this until Aoba’s friend comes in and attacks Noiz. Everything in Aoba’s room gets messed up, and even Clear shows up. What a party. After a lot of fighting that messes up Aoba’s room, his Gram shows up and breaks up the fighting between Aoba’s friend and Noiz.

After she breaks up the fight, she sits everyone down and makes them eat her food. During this time, Aoba’s friend and Noiz have a tense stare-down and continue to bicker. It makes me think of my own middle school days. I used to have a few good friends. We hung out a bunch, and we’d do a lot of mock fighting, playing superhero and exploring the woods. Sometimes when we were hitting each other with sticks, it got a little more violent; we’d hit each other a little hard, and it’d hurt. Then we’d start arguing and fighting. Eventually my parents would have to intervene and have us try to make up, sometimes over some food. It was an interesting experience, because one of my friends didn’t go to public school, so he didn’t have that much social experience, although it really could have been either of our faults when we got into a fight.

After a bit of this, the attention turns to Clear, the gas-mask-touting self-proclaimed servant of Aoba. He continues to wear the mask at the table, despite the seeming disability to eat anything with it on. Aoba and his friend question this, asking how he can even eat with it on. Clear proceeds to demonstrate how he eats: by using his hand to quickly grab the food and shove it up his mask, and being so quick that no one sees his face. The funniest thing that happened was when he wanted a drink; he unscrewed the front of his mask and pulled out a long straw, putting it into his cup and drinking it. After this relative nonsense, everyone parted ways, and Aoba told his friend that Noiz was the one that had attacked him in the first episode. Aoba didn’t tell him before because that would have just caused more violence.

The rest of the show involved Aoba and some of his friends hanging out and talking about tattoos and Rhyme; it was normal character development and bonding. After this, though, during the end, Noiz came in and made a bit of an event in the junk shop. He went in, took care of getting some kids out of the shop and kissing the little girl’s hand on their way out. Aoba, being the upstanding guy he is, told Noiz that that wasn’t normal! In fact, it was kind of strange. That’s when Noiz took the chance to just lean in there and kiss Aoba on the cheek. Like, I was relatively surprised. Aoba was even more surprised, telling Noiz that boys don’t, in fact, kiss other guys! So after that, a little more happened and the episode ended. I think Aoba is probably still embarrassed.

Watch DRAMAtical Murder on Crunchyroll or talk about this episode on our forums.

Week 003 Tally

1. Kanashimi: 1415
2. Bobby Henshin: 1350
3. Elk: 1170
4. Kayarath: 1130
5. Whiskahs: 1110
6. Sho: 840
7. The Editor: 115

Week 003 Token Counts

1. Kanashimi: 5 Tokens
2. Bobby Henshin: 7 Token
3. Elk: 3 Tokens
4. Kayarath: 2 Token
5. Whiskahs: 2 Token
6. Sho: 2 Token
7. The Editor: 1 Token

Next week’s challenge: Y’know what the teens this days are into? Lists. Descending lists. Add some sort of top-five (or bottom-five!) list to your summary for 30 points!

Make sure to vote for your favorite review below! You can give your favorite a Token!